Dhalgren (58 page)

The title-page, he noticed now, read:

BRASS
ORCHIDS
BY

He started to smile; the muscles of his mouth blocked it.

Mr Newboy, gone to the kitchen, returned now with another steaming cup.

"I guess—" the smile broke through—"you better take the 'by' off the title page."

"Ah," Mr Newboy raised his chin. "That does bring up a sort of strange subject. I talked to your friend Mr Loufer. And he told me about—"

"I mean it's okay," Kid said. "I think it would be a good idea if it came out with no name. Anonymously."

"Mr Loufer said that you're—rather picturesquely—called 'the Kid' by many of your friends?"

"That would look pretty stupid," Kid said. " 'Poems by the Kid.' I think it would be better with nothing." Somewhere beneath the thing inside that made him smile, there was the beginnings of embarrassment. He sighed, still smiling.

Gravely, Mr Newboy said: "If you really feel that way, I'll tell Roger. Are you finished looking them over?"

"Yeah."

"That was quick. How were they?"

"Uh, fine. I mean not that many mistakes."

"That's good."

"Here."

"Oh, are you sure you wouldn't like to keep the notebook?"

It was opened back in the middle. Kid lowered the papers to his lap. To avoid the feeling of confusion he let his eyes take the page's opening lines:

Poetry, fiction, drama—I am interested in the arts of incident only so far as fiction touches life; oh no, not in any vulgar, autobiographical sense, rather at the level of the most crystalline correspondence. Consider: If an author, passing a mirror, were to see one day not himself but some character of his invention, though he might be surprised, might even question his sanity, he would still have something by which to relate. But suppose, passing on the inside, the character should glance at his mirror and see, not himself, but the author, a complete stranger, staring in at him, to whom he has no relation at all, what is this poor creature left…?

Newboy was saying, "You're all sure now that you don't want to write again. But be certain, inspiration will come, arriving like one of Rilke's angels, so dazzled by its celestial journey it will have completely forgotten the message entrusted to it yet effectively delivering it merely through its marvelous presence—"

"Here!" Kid thrust out galleys and notebook. "Please take it! Please take it all. Maybe… I mean, maybe you'll want to check something else." He watched his extended hands sway to his thumping heart.

"All right," Newboy said. "No, you keep the notebook. You just may want it again." He took the papers, and hefted his case against his hip. "I'll take these back to Roger this evening." The papers rustled down in the case. "I probably won't be seeing you again. I really don't know how long the printing will take. I wish I could see the whole project through." He snapped a last snap. "I'm sure he'll send me a copy when it's done—however your mail system works here. Good-bye." His hand came forward. "I've really enjoyed the time we've spent together, the talks we've had. Do say good-bye to your little girl friend for me?"

Kid shook. "Yes, sir.
Um
… thank you very much." The notebook was on the floor, one corner over Kid's bare foot.

Newboy walked to the steps.

"Good-bye," Kid repeated into the silence.

Newboy nodded, smiled, left.

Kid waited for the disturbing memory to flicker once more. His heart quieted. Suddenly he picked up his and Newboy's coffee cup and went into the kitchen.

Seconds after he began to rinse them in the sink, he noticed how firm the water pressure was. He ran his forefinger around the crock rim. The water hissed on the enamel.

Somebody struck a dissonance on the piano.

Curious, Kid turned off the water. The cups clinked on the sideboard. As he crossed the floor, one of the boards squeaked: he had wanted to be completely quiet.

At the darker end of the auditorium, someone in work clothes stood before the brass innards. The orange construction shoes and the coveralls momentarily recalled the woman on the ladder changing the street signs.

The figure turned and walked to the couch. " 'Ey…" A heavy, flattened voice, a slight nod and slighter smile: George Harrison picked up an old
Times,
and lowered himself to the couch, crossed his legs, and opened the tabloid-size paper.

"Hello." Kid heard faint organ music.

"Y's'pos'd' be i' 'eah?" Harrison looked from behind the paper.

The natural rhythm of English speech; no, Kid thought, it
is
impossible.

"You
sure
you supposed to be in here?" George repeated.

"Reverend Tayler brought me down." (It would be stupid, he decided, even to try.)

" 'Cause if you
ain't
suppose to be in here, she gonna get mad." Harrison smiled, a mottled ivory crescent between his lips' uneven pigment. "Seen you in the bar."

"That's right." Kid grinned. "And you're in those posters all over town."

"You seen them?" Harrison put down the paper. "You know, them fellows what make them is a little—" he joggled his hand—"you know?"

Kid nodded.

"They good though. They good guys." He shook his head, then pointed at the ceiling. "She don't want no scorpion around here. You sure you're supposed to be in here. Don't matter to me, she said okay."

"I was hungry," Kid said. "She said I could get something to eat."

"Oh." Harrison turned on the couch. His green jumpsuit was open to the waist, over a banlon shirt with a raveled collar. "You come for the service?"

"No."

"Ain't no scorpion come to the damn service anyway. What you fellows dress up all that shit for?" Harrison laughed, but shook a finger. "It's cool, it's cool."

Kid looked at the large, lined knuckles and thought of the cracks in black earth. "What kind of service is it?"

"I just come because she say I should please come, so, you know, I come here sometimes." Harrison shook his head. "From Jackson, that's where—" and something Kid couldn't follow—"see?"

Though he didn't, Kid nodded. Then he became curious and asked, "What did you say?"

"In Jackson. You know what Jackson is?"

"Yeah, sure."

But Harrison was laughing again.

He,
Kid reflected,
is becoming a god,
to see what emerged from his tone of thought. Kid's inner eye was alive with visions of June.

But George stood, dropping his paper. White leaves opened and fell, one on the couch, several on the floor. "You the one they call the Kid. Yeah?"

Kid was terrified, and felt stupid for not knowing why.

"They talk about you. I heard about you. I heard what they said." The finger shook again. "You the one that don't know who he is. I heard them."

"Nobody around here got anything to do except talk," Kid said. "You know that? You know what I mean about that?"

The black hand went down against the coverall. The green wrinkled. "So you don't like it here?"

"Yeah," Kid said. "I like it… don't you?"

Harrison nodded, his cheek filled with his tongue. "You ever come over in the Jackson?" The tongue flicked the lips.

"I've walked through."

"You know any black people live over there?"

"No. Well, Paul Fenster…"

"Oh, yeah."

"But I don't know where he lives."

"You come over there and see me sometime, huh?"

"Huh?" Kid was not sure he had caught any of the last words bundled in that voice with a nap longer than velvet.

"I say 'You come pay a visit on me.' "

"Oh. Yeah. Thanks." Kid was bewildered. Searching that, he found two questions about things that rhymed which flooding embarrassment blocked. So he narrowed his eyes instead.

"Kid—" she called from the stairs behind him. Then, in a completely different voice: "George—hi there, babes!"

Kid turned. "Hey—!"

George called over him, "Hey there—" and then with a narrowing expression. "Say, this ain't your old man, is it? The guy I been hearing all that talk about over in the bar—well, say! Now the last time I seen your old lady, you know I tell her to bring you down and pay a visit to me, you hear?"

Lanya came down the steps; George walked toward them.

"Now see," Lanya said, "I haven't seen you since the park."

"If I got to invite you twice, I guess I got to invite you twice," George said, starting up. "Got to go see me the Reverend now, though. One of you drag the other on down, now." George nodded toward Kid.

"Um
… thanks," Kid said, nodded back.

"See you around," George said.

"Sure," said Lanya.

They passed.

George's response was a falsetto, "Ooooooooo," which broke and became trundling laughter. Laughter rolled beneath the ceiling like smoke. George mounted into it.

At the bottom of the stairs Lanya said, "Where've you been?" and blinked four or five times more than he thought she would have, in the silence.

"I… I couldn't find you this morning. I looked for you. I couldn't find you. At the commune, or down at the bar. What happened? Where did everybody go?"

Her eyes questioned. Her lips moved on one another, did not open.

"You want some coffee?" he asked out of discomfort, turned and went into the kitchen. "I'll go get you some coffee. It's all ready, inside."

At the urn, he picked up a cup, pulled the lever. "Did you see Tak too? How'd you know I was here?" Amber bubbles burst at the rim; black liquid steamed. "Here you—" He turned and was surprised that she was right behind him.

"Thank you." She took the cup. Steam flushed before her lowered eyes. "I saw Tak." She sipped. "He said you might be here. And that Mr Newboy was looking for you."

"He just left. He had my book. The galleys, for the poems. The type's all set."

She nodded. "Tell me what you've been doing."

"It was a pretty funny day." He poured coffee for himself, deciding as he did he had already had too much. "Really funny. After you went off, I looked for you. And I couldn't find you anywhere. I stopped in the john to wash up. When I got down to the camp site, I couldn't find you. And everybody'd run off." He put his hand on her shoulder; she smiled faintly. "I got in with some scorpions this afternoon… this evening. That was pretty strange. A guy got shot. We were on the bus, and he was bleeding. And I kept on thinking, what are they going to do with him? Where are they going to take him? There isn't any doctor around. We even had his arm in a tourniquet. I couldn't take it. So I just got off the bus. And came here. Because I was hungry. I hadn't had anything to eat all day except a God-damn pint of wine for breakfast."

"You ate here?" She looked by both his shoulders. "That's good."

"What did you do?"

She was wearing a white blouse, clean but unironed, that he had not seen before. As she walked beneath the bulb, he saw her jeans were new enough to show the crease. "You pick up some clothes this afternoon?" He followed her into the bare auditorium.

"Yesterday. I found them in a closet of the place where I'm staying now."

"You
have
been busy, huh? You found a house an' all?"

"About three days ago."

"Jesus," Kid said, "when did you get time to do that? I didn't think I let you alone long enough to go to the damn bathroom, much less find a house—"

"Kid…" She turned on the word to lean against the sofa arm. In the hall, shrill echoes returned. "Kid," much more softly, "I haven't seen you in
five
days!"

"Huh?" The heel on the floor and the heel in his boot prickled. Prickling rose up his legs, spread about his thighs. "What do you mean?"

"What do you mean what do I mean?" She spoke clumsily, breaking through three tones of voice. "Where have you
been?"
Retreating from the clumsiness, her voice was left only with hurt. "Why did you go away? What did you do all this time?"

Little things clawed between his buttocks, mounted rib by rib, perched on his shoulder to nip at his neck so he had to drop his chin. Lines of perspiration suddenly cooled. "You're kidding with me, aren't you? Like with the moons?"

She looked puzzled.

"The night when the moons first came out, and later we were talking about them; you pretended that there had just been one, and that I had been seeing things. You're fooling with me like that now?"

"No!" She shook her head, stopped it in the middle of a shake. "Oh, no…"

His cheeks felt like pincushions.

"Kid, what
happened
since the last time you saw me?"

"We woke up, when those sons of bitches were standing around us, right?"

She nodded.

"Then you went away, and I… well, I hung around for a little while, and then I went down to the john to wash up. I guess I took an awful long time. I should have hurried… But there was this guy there, Pepper, a scorpion." The prickling had left his feet: it felt as though he were being poured full of cold water. It rose behind his knees. "Pepper and me, we went down to the camp site, only it had been abandoned."

"John and Milly didn't move the commune till the day after I saw you last; they thought it would be safer."

"Then we went to Teddy's to look for you. Only it wasn't open yet. And I had a lot of wine with Bunny—you know the guy who dances there. I gave him a message for you."

She nodded. "Yes, he gave it to me… the day before yesterday!"

"No," he said. "Because I gave it to him this morning." The water reached his loins, poured into his scrotum; his scrotum shriveled. "Then I went out, and ended up at that department store downtown. That's where I met the other guys, and we broke into the place. There were people living in there. We got out. But they shot one of the guys. We just got him out of there, on the God-damn bus that happened to be coming along!"

"That happened
two
nights ago, Kid! Some of the scorpions came into the bar and wanted to know if anybody knew where they could get a doctor. Madame Brown went with them, but she came back in about ten minutes. Everybody was talking about it all yesterday."